Living and Studying Abroad at Meiji

y name is Qin Xianyong. I'm currently enrolled at the Japanese Literature Department doing a post graduate doctoral course. My field of research is mainly the study of Japanese language, in particular the ancient Chinese used in the Meiji Period.

My home town is Taipei City in Taiwan, and my alma mater is the Fu Jen Catholic University in Taipei Prefecture. Unfortunately, it doesn't have any formal links with Meiji University yet.

Different from being on a showy campus where study is just a part of your student life, the post graduate lifestyle is one of being totally concentrated on one's research. It means that your life is only about your research. Research is something you undertake by yourself and you must decide everything by yourself including gathering documents related to your research theme and planning how to go about the research.

It can be said that Meiji is a university that empowering the individual due to its philosophy and policies. However, I never feel loneliness along this path of study. What I mean is that appropriate guidance from a guidance professor is always available. And my juniors and seniors in the research room enthusiastically give me advice regardless of my year of study. I can also ask the opinion of other post graduate students of different majors.

There is a Japanese language studies seminar held as a summer camp each year. During the summer holidays, post graduate students participate together with fourth grade undergraduate students of the same department using a seminar house at Kiyosato and Yamanakako (facilities owned by the university).

The undergraduate students expected to submit a thesis for their major work on that and plan the direction of their graduation theses. Graduate students use the time to plan and outline of the contents of their master's or doctoral theses. Other graduate students announce their research achievements from the first half of the year. It's a very academic summer camp.

Of course, it's not all study; we use the intervals between presentations and all go outside the seminar house together and take a stroll around the neighborhood. The schedule is designed to relieve the fatigue of giving presentations. This kind of balance makes the summer camp something everybody looks forward to each year.

For those coming to Japan to study, I think it is of course important to study within the field of one's chosen major, however it's also important to understand Japanese culture, to appreciate how interesting Japanese language is and learn its forms of speech, and to develop friendships. For me, these were all things I got by entering Meiji University. I think coming to Meiji was the right decision for me. I sincerely wish everyone a fulfilling future student life.